Article at Wired: The Secret Cause of Flame Wars

[sleipnir214]

This Wired.com article reports on an article in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

We aparently have only a 50% chance of interpreting correctly the tone of an email. But we think we're accurate 90% of the time.

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,70179-0.html?tw=wn_index_2

Want the best answers? Ask the best questions! TANSTAAFL!

 

[columb]

One of the reasons I like this forum is that we are all concerned with gettng our message across accurately. OK, sometimes we become grammer or spelling nazis but the underlying desire is to produce output which is correctly understood by more thatn 50% of our audience.

Having said this I have become well aware of how dangerous sarcasm or irony are when used on sites like this one.

Columb Healy

 

[LFI]

I'm sure.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
O Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!

 

[LFI]

The article backs up what Shakespeare said quite some time ago (and folks like Aristotle probably said long before that):

_{Casca has just described how the violent storm can be interpreted as a warning that Caesar's reign will be a bloody one.}

CICERO
Indeed, it is a strange-disposed time:
But men may construe things after their fashion,
Clean from the purpose of the things themselves.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
O Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!

 

[stormbind]

It is my hypothesis that these effects are exagerated when readers actively attempt to disambiguate a message: the reader is less likely to give second thought to a misunderstood sentence *shrug*

--Glen

Memoria mihi benigna erit qui eam perscribam